Fabienne Auzolle

Born in Clermont-Ferrand, France, 1967

Ecole du Louvre, History of Art at Sorbonne-Paris, ENSAA-Duperré, Manufactures Nationales; holds a diploma from the Centre Artisanal de la Terre

Ceramist Fabienne Auzolle studied primitive firing techniques in Burkina Faso and glazed earthenware in Italy. She has taught the plastic arts and ceramics since 1990. She exhibits regularly abroad (US, Norway, Brussels, Korea, Singapore) and in France (including at the Musée d’Art et d’Industrie Roubaix-La Piscine in 2014), and produces luxuriant works of art "for touching", which mingle cultures and centuries, and are redolent of beliefs and myths. Her creations mainly strive to transcribe the power of the elements through glazed ceramic Figures, all devoted to women. In Déesse et mère, Femme-idole and Femme-Arbre de Vie, she creates an ideal, mystical, dream-like image of Woman in majesty. But her Figures can also befull of the lightness, vitality and causticity of female society ­– thoroughly knowing in any age!

Mamadou Cissé

Born in Baghagha, Senegal, 1960

Lives and works in Osny, France

In 1978 Mamadou Cissé arrived in France at the age of 18, and started working in diverse jobs in industrial trade, design and bakery. An autodidact, he went back to his artistic practice in 2001 and started drawing during the long hours as a night watchman. Since then he draws imaginary cities, birds-eye perspectives, and futuristic visions, very colorful and rich in picturesque details. He creates his own world, fascinated by the world cities, their architecture, their urbanism and their energy. Mamadou Cissé believes in progress, better future and living conditions. He dreams ideal cities, with houses for all, and colors to spread Joy. “I am futuristic, forward ho!” says the visionary artist.

Since 2009, Mamadou Cissé has taken part in many exhibitions in institutions including Fondation Cartier, Paris, Dakar Biennale, Senegal, and Fondation Blachère, Apt, France.

Jill Galliéni

Born in Aix-en-Provence, France, 1948

Lives and works in Paris

Jill Galliéni works mainly in three directions—textile sculpture, drawing with needles and writing that becomes abstraction. She sculpts mysterious yarn-and-fabrics dolls to "build a universe running parallel to [her] reality.” They are huge and motionless, with or without eyes, turned inwards. "They are not on a human scale, they mustn't even look like humans. They are not our doubles, they are our spirit" says the artist. Since 2007, Galliéni has been placing women into groups; she sees them as "dancing souls". She also designs embroidered princesses, on sheer organdie. Their bodies gradually take shape with their features energetically sewn in a sort of electric writing. Alongside her dolls, Galliéni started writing and sewing prayers for Saint Rita, patron saint of lost causes. Illegible, automatic writing forms a design to become a composition. Galliéni’s ally, yarn, helps her to weave, regroup, design, link up, sew. "I get the impression that the innermost feelings, my contradictions and sources of joy are all reflected in my work.”

Jill Galliéni has been on display in personal and collective exhibitions in many institutions like Centre Pompidou, Paris, France, Musée Art et Marges, Brussels, Belgium, Institut Français, New York and Musée Bargoin, Clermont-Ferrand, France.

Marie-Rose Lortet

Born in Strasbourg, France, 1945

Lives and works in Vernon, France

In 1969, Marie-Rose Lortet was encouraged by Dubuffet, who acquired some of her works and expressed his enthusiasm for her “small knittings.” Very early on, Lortet, who grew up watching her mother and grandmother knit, broke free from the utilitarian aspect of knitting to paint pictures in yarn. Lortet knits stories and gives them poetic or funny titles, with an eternal youth. She does not make preparatory drawings, nor have a canvas, allowing the work to spontaneously come into being. “Knitting lets the mind and the imagination take the time to travel and create pictures”, she says, “my yarn is my palette; I combine colors like a painter.” Bursting with creativity, Lortet might start and finish a work in a single go or, on the contrary, enjoy watching it come alive over a period of months. In fact, the artist has never completely finished the four series she goes back to whenever it strikes her fancy: Territoires de Laine, Les Masques, Architectures de Fil, and Miniatures.

Marie-Rose Lortet’s work is often presented in solo and collective exhibitions in institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, Paris, Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, Art Brut Museum, Lausanne, Switzerland, Musée de Vernon, France, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, Angers.

Baudouin Mouanda

Born in Ouesso, Congo-Brazzaville, 1981

Lives and works in Brazzaville

Baudouin Mouanda is one of the most promising young photographers working in Africa. The man who defines himself as a "photographer of life" produces series imbued with realism, poetry and questionings. He started out in photography in 1993 when he was 12, earning a camera from his father for doing well in his studies. He rapidly began to capture life in Brazzaville, and was dubbed "Photouin.” Turning away from conformism and classical photography, he focused on the history of his country. His explorations led to his first, highly sensitive work, The Aftermath of War. In 2008, he photographed the most splendid "Sapeurs" of Brazzaville. Since then, the photographer has undertaken numerous residences abroad. In Libreville, Gabon, he developed his work, Hip Hop and Society. Initiated in 2011, his Pavement of Knowledge project shows the African students who seek refuge in what they call "the great library under the stars." Currently Mouanda focuses on the significance of marriage with Congolese Dreams.

Baudouin Mouanda has participated in exhibitions at many institutions including Musée Dapper, Paris, Musée des Confluences, Lyon, Fondation Blachère, Apt, “Rencontres de Bamako”, Mali, Rencontres de la Photographie, Arles, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Marseille, African Emerging Photography at the Joburg Art Fair, in Gabon and in Equatorial Guinea, Dakar Biennale, Senegal, and Kyotographie, Kyoto, Japan. Voted Best Photographer by the Fine Arts Academy of Kinshasa, Baudouin Mouanda received many prizes and awards such as Fondation Blachère award, the Bolloré Young Talent prize, the silver medal in the seventh Jeux de la Francophonie, and was the winner for the Central Africa region in the “Beauty in Africa” photo competition staged jointly by the African Union and European Union.

Selected Permanent Collections

Contemporary African Art Collection-Jean Pigozzi, Geneva

Devereux Collection, London

Fondation Blachère, Apt, France

Bolloré Logistics, Paris, France

Foundation Zinsou, Cotonou, Benin

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, eidtion of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 30 x 45 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 90 x 60 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2013

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 90 x 60 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 90 x 70 cm, edition of 10

Untitled, Sapeurs de Bacongo series, 2008

C-print, 60 x 90 cm, edition of 10

French Craft

The French Craft Project is not a concept but "a poetic art of life" defined by "nomadic" art objects whose excellence wavers between passion and reason!

These unique pieces are made by the contemporary heirs of 17th and 18th-century French craftsmanship.

Their singularity and outstanding materials combine the “beautiful” with the “useful”, the “exceptional” and the “unusual”.

These art-loving craftsmen and women are among the world's best feather-workers, straw marquetry inlayers, silversmiths, heraldic engravers…

The quintessence of Parisian chic can be found in today's most common and nomadic object, the suitcase! This revolutionary, beautiful, light, extremely elegant ambassador in titanium and carbon will cross the Channel to deliver its treasures in London, including crazy feathers, a rare silversmith's dish with 1950s pictorial accents, a precious box inlaid with gems like a jewel, an incredible silver teapot straight out of a Jules Verne novel, gigantic straw eggs, miniature embossed architecture, a theatre of characters made of enamel clay, contemporary silver and metal thread lace, infinite writing space or Continuum covered with parchment, a collection of performing insects…

The humorous, elegant exhibition is like a modern-day trip through Alice's Wonderland!

Anybody can invent a personal use for these intimate, whimsical, refined art objects. They turn every day into an adventurous journey and any house into a dream home. No talkative objects but visual, tactile, beautiful and unforgettable pieces. Catch the French Craft spirit!